THE HUMAN SENSOR

“Human Sensor” examines breathing as an interface between environment and our inner-selves (“invironment”), highlighting our own bodies as the sensor for diagnosing the condition and thus health of our surroundings. It is a futuristic narrative in which people with COPD and asthma are used to detect changes in the air quality in urban environment. Increasingly more people develop respiratory health problems due to expanding but invisible amount of air borne pollutions – made worse not only by industrial and urban growth, but also by the warming of the atmosphere. Lack of accessible and clear information about the air quality data places us in a particularly vulnerable position – after all we all must breath to stay alive and we are all dependent on the air.

CONTRIBUTION

The Human Sensor Garment is able to process the prerecorded air quality data containing values of black carbon (PM 2.5) and detailed geolocation coordinates together with the real time data of the rhythm of a wearer breath; All this information in return influences the behaviour of led lights embedded in the wearable.

Role //

Creative Technologist

Task //

Development and programming of garment’s technology using Raspberry Pi, Adafruit Neopixels LED matrix, Temperature sensor (to sense the exhaled breath). In addition there is a 3G connectivity using MQTT to display the PM 2.5 and geolocation information on the website in real time.